A sermon given on the 2nd Sunday in the Advent of the Christ, at St. Paul's Episcopal Cathedral in Oklahoma City, by Fr. Tim Sean Youmans+. 2 Peter 3.8-15.
Zeitgeist. Its a word that describes the collective subconscious of the culture. The word is often attributed to the philosopher Georg Hegel, but he never actually used the word. He used the phrase; der Geist seiner Zeit "no person can surpass their own time, for the spirit of their time is also their own spirit.
You may not think about the end of the world, but the collective culture, without question, is doing that very thing. It is in our zeitgeist. Televisions shows: The Walking Dead, The Left Overs, Falling Skies, Revolution, Supernaturtal, Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles, Dollhouse Bad, Fringe, Dark Angel, Terra Nova, Jericho, The Stand, Heros. It is a long list. I could give you a similar list in movies. Interstellar being one that is in theaters right now.
The scripts of these films put the question before you; put in the worst of scenarios, what would you do? Who would you be? What kinds of things would you risk?
In the epistle, the letter of 2 Peter, he writes that one day Jesus would return and end history. The theological word for it is Parousia. And it refers to the visitation of Jesus when he returns, and that means the period between when he was here physically in history to when he comes again. Jesus’ disciples were convinced he would return in their lifetime. It is exactly how they remembered him saying it; “This generation shall not pass before the Son of Man comes in his glory.”
I’m still enough of a romantic to sense this will indeed happen one day. But all earnest romantics eventually become disillusioned, and I confess to you that I wonder at the wait. 2000 years is a very long time, even in Biblical rhythms. And so we ask questions, did the disciples remember it wrong? Or, so much of the way Jesus spoke was in parable and figurative language, was this “return” meant to be understood that way?
This past October we had what is called a blood moon. A lunar eclipse when the refraction of light turns the moon smoky red. The prophets Isaiah, Daniel, Joel and Amos in the Hebrew scriptures were fascinated with them. You can understand why. To the ancients, it looks like the Moon was soaked with blood. And like a black raven, they associated it with something bad that was getting ready to happen.
They thought it was a omen that God was coming to judge people for being evil. When Jesus talked about the ‘Day of the Lord” he was using the language of the Hebrew prophets before him for the end of the world.
The Christians also quoted words in the book of Acts and the Apostle John mentions the blood moons in his Revelation.
There is a preacher in Texas who has come up with a theory about them:
He points out that NASA has calculated when all the solar and lunar eclipses occured back centuries. It turns out that there have been two blood moons in the same Jewish year, one the first day of Sukkot, the Jewish Festival of Tents in the (FALL), AND the other second one on the first day of Passover (in the Spring). Both of these festivals are Passover holy days, and they frame the Jewish year. These two blood moons have occurred in the same Jewish year on these two holy days, six times, since the birth of Jesus.
The blood moon this past fall occurred on the first day of the Jewish feast of Sukkoth. And this spring there will be a blood moon on the first day of Passover. This will be the seventh time this pairing will occur since the birth of Jesus. The seventh time the Jewish year will be framed by blood moons.
What is significant about the number 7 in the Jewish imagination?
It is a sign of a perfect cycle, a beginning, and an end. In John’s Revelation, his language is the Alpha and Omega. It is the number of God.
Now this intriguing discovery has captured the attention of Bible prophecy nerds everywhere and they are losing their minds.
Whether or not these lunar eclipses point to the end of time is impossible to prove. And Jesus said that no one knows the day or the hour. These kinds of predictions have been made over and over in history and most turn up wrong. But what it does point to is the way our imaginations about God, judgment, and the end of time interact and play with scientific observations, the phenomenon that we see. When science and imagination mix, it can be fascinating.
Fascinating, because they both ask us to think about the way we live and how that affects other people. A scientific apocalypse is concerned with what happens when we use up all our natural resources, poison all our clean water, or destroy our ozone. A religious apocalypse is what God does when we abandon holy living and reject God and mistreat each other. Both are about behavior and consequences, but in profoundly nuanced ways.
It’s in our imagination, our subconscious. And the Zeitgeist most often shows up in the collective expression of the arts. For run of the mill everyday Jack and Janes, that’s TV and cinema. It’s on our minds, folks.
Hear the words of Peter in the epistle;
Do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day. The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.
Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, what sort of person ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire? But, in accordance with his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.
And remember, our Lord’s patience gives people time to be saved. This is what our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you with the wisdom God gave him. +++
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